Holtz lives up to his famous surname

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Published: October 7, 2008

Don’t expect to see East Carolina football coach Skip Holtz calling in to ESPN’s “Dr. Lou” segment any time soon. That’s where coaches and players call in to see the advice of “Dr. Lou,” who in reality is former coaching great Lou Holtz, who just happens to be Skip’s father.

Instead, Skip will keep his questions private about his upcoming game with Virginia at high noon on Saturday in Charlottesville. When he makes his weekly phone call to Dad, there will be discussion about the Cavaliers.

“I’ve gotten a lot of mileage out of that,” Holtz said Tuesday about the Dr. Lou episodes that are featured as part of ESPN’s college football game coverage. “Every time we talk on the phone, I make sure he’s not taping me so that I don’t make a surprise appearance on Thursday night’s ‘Dial Dr. Lou.’”

Off to a quick start

While the elder Holtz, a Hall of Famer, has been a great sounding board for his son, Skip has done pretty well on his own. In fact, Skip is the second-fastest ECU coach to reach the

23-win mark at the Greenville, N.C., school (only behind Hall of Famer Pat Dye), and is in his fourth season as head coach of the Pirates. His team beat Virginia in their last meeting, a 31-21 decision at ECU in 2006 (aaaarrrrgh), and the Pirates were ranked as high as No. 14 in the national polls last month after posting back-to-back upsets over Virginia Tech and West Virginia.

Coming off a bye week (just like the last time ECU played Virginia), Holtz’s Pirates stand at 3-2 after consecutive losses to N.C. State in overtime (30-24), and a 17-point loss to Houston (41-24) in the last two outings. Now, his team is catching a Virginia squad that is getting its act together, having upset Maryland 31-0 last weekend.

Impressed with Verica

“The difference between Duke [a 31-3 UVa loss] and Maryland is that I see a quarterback [Marc Verica] that is kind of evolving on film,” Holtz said. “The quarterback played the first two games on the road and was thrown into an unfortunate situation in the Connecticut game as late as all that happened. But he’s developed and gotten better and better.”

Holtz is convinced that his Pirates are going to see more of the Virginia team that shut out Maryland as opposed to the one that was beaten by Duke.

Studying game tapes of the Cavaliers, Holtz said he has been impressed with the defense all season long, but that he couldn’t help but notice the offensive improvement.

“[Virginia’s] defense is big and physical, very athletic and has a great third down package,” Holtz observed. “I really like what Coach [Al] Groh is doing as far as the scheme. He’s putting his players in a position to succeed defensively. It’s not fancy, they just line up and coach the fundamentals.”

Offensively, the difference in Duke and Maryland wasn’t fancy either.

“They were able to come out and the offensive line took over the ball game,” Holtz said. “When they were able to run it, then all of a sudden it opened up a lot of avenues for them with the play-action pass.”

Verica, a sophomore, played his best game in his third start and Holtz thought that the UVa field general did a good job of managing the game.

Though he has studied the Cavaliers extensively, he has also been preoccupied with trying to heal his team’s wounds. ECU experienced a meteoric rise in the polls after the two upsets and a late-game win over Tulane, setting off a euphoria in eastern North Carolina that hasn’t been felt in a while.

“For a group of guys that had never been ranked, I think they were just excited to be where they were,” Holtz said. “It was almost like we were trying to protect something we never earned.”

Those who festoon themselves in purple and gold were anticipating the best, and even one interview ended with Holtz being told, well, now that your hard games (Tech and WVU) are over, you can run the table.

“I said, whoa, whoa … there’s 10 games left on the schedule,” Holtz cautioned. “We’ve been very humbled the last two games. We’ve had time to sit down and talk about it, evaluate it.”

Saturday will be his second trip to Scott Stadium, having accompanied his father’s South Carolina team here in 2002, a game that was Virginia’s line in the sand after having dropped its first two games to Colorado State and Florida State. The Cavs rallied behind quarterback Matt Schaub and knocked off the No. 22 Gamecocks.

Skip Holtz was Lou’s offensive coordinator, a job he had taken to be close to his family. Skip had led Connecticut football from the depths of I-AA football to the playoffs and a 10-win season. As a reward, he had been offered a longterm contract as the Huskies had received an invitation to join the Big East and ground had been broken for a new stadium.

Blood is thicker than water, and the youngest Holtz decided he couldn’t turn down his father’s offer.

“It was very difficult to leave Connecticut. I had put my name on the program and built something,” the ECU coach said. “Unfortunately, my mother got sick. Financially, leaving Connecticut was not a smart decision and I was the head coach of a team that had won 10 games and had a lot of good things going on. But my wife said that 20 years from now, when my mom and dad were gone, would I regret the move?”

The Holtz’s picked up and moved to Columbia, S.C., where things were interesting. He took over as the Gamecocks’ offensive coordinator, a job he was confident that he could handle. Working for Lou at Notre Dame as the OC, Skip helped the Irish to a 21-2-1 record as coordinator and his offense was ranked in the top 10 nationally during the 1991 and ’93 seasons.

In Columbia, he experienced some of the same criticism that Virginia offensive coordinator Mike Groh is going through now.

“It’s great from a family standpoint to have the opportunity to work together,” Skip Holtz said. “It’s very difficult in the situation as far as working for your father. I say that from the standpoint of knowing my situation with my father’s background being all on offense and as much of an offensive coach as he was.

“Mike is probably going through this as well,” Holtz said. “Being the offensive coordinator, every time we did something well it was Coach Holtz and his experience. And every time we did something poor, it was that stupid son of his. It’s a challenge.”

His critique of Mike Groh’s job?

“When you look at the success of what they’ve had the last couple of weeks with the way the quarterback has started a groove, [Mike’s] done a real nice job with that offense,” Holtz said.

Virginia’s offense is only one of Holtz’s problems when his Pirates, a touchdown underdog, comes to Scott Stadium for Holtz’s 100th game as a head coach on Saturday.

He’s hoping he won’t have to make an emergency call to Dr. Lou.